A27009:382
The right method for a settled peace of conscience, and spiritual comfort in 32…
The right method for a settled peace of conscience, and spiritual comfort in 32 directions : written for the use of a troubled friend / and now published by Richard Baxter ...
London: printed for T. Underhil, 1653
Modern spelling is a reading aid: the words are the author’s, only the spelling is modernized. Original shows the page as printed, with the transcription marks.
1. There are those sins which a man cannot avoid though he would: which are in the gentlest sense called Sins of Infirmity. Here note 1. That Adam had none such. 2. And that the reason of them is because 1. Our Reason which should direct, and our Wills themselves which should command, are both Imperfect. 2. And our Faculties that should be commanded and directed are by sin grown impotent and obstinate, and have contracted ⟨p. 257⟩a rebelling disobedient disposition. 3. And that degree of Grace, which the best attain to in this life, is not such as wholly to overcome either the imperfection of the guiding and commanding faculty, or the rebellion of the obeying faculties. Otherwise if our own Wills were perfect, and the rebellion of the inferior faculties cured, no man could then say, The good that I would I do not, and the evil that I would not that I do. For the Will would so fully command, that all would obey, and it self being perfect, all would be perfect. And therefore in Heaven it is and will be so.
1. There are those sinnes which a man cannot avoid though he would: which are in the gentlest sense called Sins of Infirmity. Here note 1. That Adam had none such. 2. And that the reason of them is because 1. Our Reason which should direct, and our Wils themselves which should command, are both Imperfect. 2. And our Faculties that should be commanded and directed are by sin grown impotent and obstinate, and have contracted ⟨p. 257⟩a rebelling disobedient disposition. 3. And that degree of Grace, which the best attain to in this life, is not such as wholly to overcome either the imperfection of the guiding and commanding faculty, or the rebellion of the obeying faculties. Otherwise if our own Wils were perfect, and the rebellion of the inferiour faculties cured, no man could then say, The good that I would I do not, and the evil that I would not that I do. For the Will would so fully command, that all would obey, and it self being perfect, all would be perfect. And therefore in Heaven it is and will be so.